


The Blood of the Covenant

by theycallmethejackal



Category: The West Wing
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-09
Updated: 2018-09-09
Packaged: 2019-07-10 07:31:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15944666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theycallmethejackal/pseuds/theycallmethejackal
Summary: The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb.





	The Blood of the Covenant

Donna doesn't keep in great contact with her family. While they insist they are proud of her accomplishments, she can hear in their voices the disappointment that she is still unmarried and working for a Democrat -  _the_ Democrat. She sees it in their faces when she comes home for a Christmas in 1998. She is ecstatic about the prospect of working in the White House for the next four years, but her mother is more excited that Ben graduated from medical school and  _why don't you give him another chance?_ Her father is happy she has found her calling, but it seems to be a dealbreaker that she's working for this particular president. Her brothers spend more time drinking with her ex-boyfriend than hanging out with their sister during the one week she is home. As for her sister, she just keeps bringing up that Donna will never meet a husband or have a family if she's working in D.C. And she says all of this while rubbing her own pregnant belly and smirking. Amaryllis always did enjoy being the favorite. So for all these reasons, Donna doesn't call or visit very often. It is too exhausting.

Luckily Donnatella Moss has two families.

She has her oldest brother Toby, gruff and stubborn, but with an enormous amount of respect for her. He was the one who told her the President was sick. While he is grumpy, he is also filled with optimism for the future of their country. He is able to craft a message with such eloquence that even Republicans have to stop and really think about what has been said. It took him longer than the rest to warm up to Donna, but he's that way with everyone. Strangely enough, she never felt closer to Toby than when he told her that her best friend had been shot. Some might call it insensitive, but if it hadn't been phrased so simply and clinically, she might have fallen apart right there in front of everyone. He protected her even if he didn't know it. And when he leaked information to the press, Donna was the first member of the former Bartlet team to visit him, bringing along a bottle of whiskey and a blueberry pie.

She has gained a sister in CJ Cregg, who doesn't have the same power to craft a message as Toby but does everything she can to change the world with the literal soapbox she has been given. Regardless of rank or position, everyone in the West Wing has a voice with CJ, and she has never made Donna feel that her opinion is worth less than anyone on senior staff. From day one of Donna's time on the campaign, CJ pushed her and helped her learn more in one month than she learned in a full two years of college. But beyond their professional relationship, CJ always made Donna feel like a friend. Even during the lockdown when they had that horrible eye-opening conversation about her job, she felt like the older woman understood her more than her biological sister ever has. And when Donna discovered the reason for Senator Stackhouse's filibuster, CJ was the one who stood by her the whole time.

Sam Seaborn is her second big brother and has been since day one when he heard Josh shout for her and yelled back for him to shut up before Donna even had the chance to move from her seat. He has a heart of gold and a silver tongue, which makes him a valuable asset to the White House. One night on the campaign trail, when Josh's sensitive system had gotten the better of him, only Donna and Sam remained in the hotel bar, nursing a couple of beers at a table littered with the then empty or waterlogged glasses left behind by their sleeping friends. Sam looked at her and asked quietly what she would think if he ran for Congress. She just smiled and said that if she was a resident of that district, she'd be the first one in line at the polls on election day. When he did run five years later, he fired a staff member for horrible things he said to Donna. She so wished she would have had the foresight and funds to move to Orange County in 2001.

She has a mother called Abigail Bartlet, First Lady of the United States, a brilliant doctor, and bona fide member of the Sisterhood. Donna hadn't spent much time with her until the night of Abbey's birthday when she successfully planted her own foot in her mouth, but for some reason the First Lady had enjoyed it and organized for the band to play "O Canada" just for her, a lowly assistant who had gotten a little too drunk and loose-lipped and called out the most powerful woman in the country for her bullshit. Dr. Bartlet had called her early on in Josh's recovery in order to give her some advice about how to help, but when Donna herself had been hurt in Gaza, Abbey Bartlet stopped by her desk in the bullpen or called her nearly every day after Donna returned to check on her recovery process and pester her about physical therapy. And on her first day at Russell for President, there was a card on her desk addressed to Donnatella Moss in a familiar scrawl. 

She has a father in Jed Bartlet, who watched her grow from a young woman who raised her hand in the Oval Office to a brilliant political operative who could answer any question thrown at her with grace and poise, and he told her at Leo's wake that she reminded him quite a bit of a certain press secretary they both knew well. President Bartlet had taken ten minutes out of his day to call her high school English teacher and debate  _Beowulf_ and  _Twelfth Night_ with her just because it was important to Donna. He may be the leader of the free world, but he can still make time to put a smile on the face of someone he cares for. This man had inspired her to throw away a life where she had settled for less than she deserved in order to pursue something greater, and for that she will forever be grateful.

She had another father in Leo McGarry, whose funeral she attended just over a year ago. A man who dedicated his life to his country, forsaking, at times, his own happiness. And despite his often curmudgeonly attitude, his door was always open. Especially on Big Block of Cheese Day. During the first Bartlet for America campaign, she had been in Josh's office trying to get things organized when her boss came in and started badgering her about how the hell he was supposed to find anything when she was moving it all. Sometime in the middle of the argument, Leo had appeared just beyond the doorway and watched the two go back and forth until finally Donna put Josh in his place and he left the room with the file she had easily been able to locate thanks to her system. Leo then entered the office, and with his signature smirk, he had told her, "Kid, you're going to be here until the curtain comes down." 

And then there's Joshua Lyman.

She has spent many a day pondering her relationship with him and how exactly to define him in this second family she has developed over the years, but after a decade of calling him her best friend (because even when they weren't speaking, he still was), she knows now that his role in this family of hers is and always has been _husband_. Before they started dating, before the night he first made love to her, before the morning he kissed her in a fit of excitement, he was her person. During the Russell for President campaign, she had picked up the phone wanting to call him no fewer than fifty times. Because he's the person she wants to share her successes and failures with. He's the one she wants to kiss goodnight and good morning every day for the next forty or so years. He's the one who believed in her when she barely believed in herself.

So she smiles in the middle of their living room with tears in her eyes, and in front of her brothers and sister, she says  _yes_.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know if you guys have figured this out yet but I love writing about Donna.
> 
> Leo's comment, for those who don't know, is what John Spencer said to Janel Moloney when they were shooting the pilot, and I thought it would fit well into Leo & Donna's relationship.


End file.
